The Report
by Captain Jim
Summary: After the shortest and most costly war on Earth, a team of scientists record all they can about the war, including events, the invaders, their technology, and the personal effects it had on people, which will be explained in interviews with the survivors.


A study after the War. 

Hello. It has been, as you probably know, 10 years after the great Martian Invasion that caused massive havoc on the human race and Earth itself, as well as the other animals on Earth. Only the pre-adolescent children of the world do not know the horror that we faced in two weeks. How did we survive? How did we discover so much about the invaders? This report, filed by 20 of the world's most esteemed scientists, will tell.

I. THE INVADERS.

THEIR HOME:

The invaders have been verified as from the dying planet of Mars. The Hubble telescope first came to discover this when the capsules carrying the piloting aliens were blasted from Mars. It was watching Mars and a green blast was seen for but a moment by the scientists viewing it's recording until the base's electricity went dead. They did not have any EMP hardened equipment like most of the Government's military and scientific equipment. However, they had a backup generator, which soon came online. However, when they did, a recording from the President came on, warning them to a nearby underground shelter stocked with food. This act saved many of the greatest minds of Earth.

After another research robot sent to Mars five years ago famously found a small Martian community, it was known that the world's surface was so hot they could not live there and they were forced underground. However, their planet's core crust was breaking apart because they had dug so deep homes and they would soon be exposed directly to the core. Most leading scientists agree that the Martian attacked us because they needed a new home- Earth, a young, fertile planet. As we know, Earth did not want to be taken, and the massive heat rising on Mars indicates that they should have died out by now.

II. THE INVADERS:

The Martians modeled their Tripod after how they themselves looked - The three legs and head size are reminiscent of the aliens. They are very technologically advanced to the point where they do little manual labor and have grown weak. Only in one account, that of one Ray Ferrier and his daughter, include the creatures walking around for several minutes without growing tired. They had no hand-held weapons and when those foolish pilots who wandered about were found by soldiers, police, or armed civilians, they were quickly and easily silenced. Even in a hand-to-hand fight they were unable to hold their ground and a popular technique was to knee them in the head. Several comedians have joked that the guy who came up with this got kneed in his testicles too often. The creatures had leathery skin and gigantic black eyes that made many uncomfortable. They used the blood of the captured to create a red weed which was attempting to terraform the Earth into a new Mars. The plant could not survive on the surface of Mars, even on the icecaps, and was forced to retreat underground with the aliens. Red weed is still being studied, in an attempt to see why the aliens were terraforming the Earth. Was it for familiarity or was there a true reason? All that is truly known is that the blood of just a human provided enough for the aliens that they did not need all the humans, dispatching roughly three-quarters of those killed either with black smoke or their heat-ray.

They were noted for their curiosity- some of the stronger aliens went down to investigate the human homes in curiosity, using laptops, looking at photos, and even listening to music! Aside from fear, upon being cornered by humans, or rage, which several reputable military forces have reported the aliens having at their times of death, these were their only emotions.

III. THEIR TOOLS:

Tripod. No other word conjures up such a spine-tingling, fearful image to those who survived the war. Tripods were roughly 150 feet in height, though many parts of them were biogenetically grown, so the exact height is hard to discern. The leaders of the Martian invasion had bigger tripods, and the normal soldiers had smaller ones. However, their weapons remained the same: Most of the Tripods had two heat rays which they used with deadly elegance and eifficiency. Many medium-sized (medium-ranking) Tripods had black smoke canisters. The kind of gas the black smoke is is unknown- it was just deadly. Moving about as fast as a typical human can run, it clung to the ground and crawled, sucking up unfortunate people. These medium Tripods were only found near large metropolitan areas. Many have theorized that the aliens studied us from afar, and somehow learned where we would construct huge cities like Hong Kong, New York, and Paris. Black smoke was also mostly used after several tripods were destroyed by handheld explosive weapons- effectively disallowing soldiers near the tripods, or at least, that kind.  
The electromagnetic pulse of the capsules entering their tripods was devestating. Many's cars stopped working and their homes were mostly rendered useless. Some were stuck in hotels, as the electronics that read their "keys" (many hotels had cards at the time) were unable to work, forcing some of them inside until the EMP effect ended- It took 10 days and it is assumed that the Martians thought none of us, or not enough of us, would be left, for it to make much of a difference. In Dallas, however, their homes were untouched by the Tripod attack, and it took 10 days for the Tripods to find them. There was a massive traffic jam to another place where death undoubtedly reigned- and why did so many resign to this fate? It is the refugee mindset- They only think of escape. Many no longer thought anymore, as a tripod saw the long line of cars, dispensed several black smoke canisters, and moved on. It spread among the cars and many died as it was a hot day and their windows were open. Those who left their windows shut, however, survived until it dissipated. However, most military equipment, and some media equipment (allowing news producer Rachel Errin and her team of two people to capture a capsule entering the ground) was EMP hardened and thus little damage was done, for the little good it did the military and media.  
The Tripods were shielded by a form of light that little is known about, as they all stopped functioning when the Aliens caught their sickness. However, the shield had to drop to allow the heat-ray to pass for only a couple of seconds, and it had to stop for a longer period of time for a tentacle to move, in order to, for example, grab a person or use their cameras to scout areas for survivors. Most military fire was wasted, save on some occasions. Out of the 4,500 tripods and their pilots that landed on Earth, 250 were killed before the sickness. Once again, Ray Ferrier must be mentioned- He was the only civlian to kill a tripod and nearly gave his life in the process. President Bush himself gave Ferrier the Medal of Honor, a first for a civilian, after the war. After the sickness, around 750 were killed by surviving troops. The other 3,500 succumbed to Mother Nature.  
The Heat Ray. It has killed more than Hitler, Pol Pot, or any other genocidal dictator. Humans and animals were killed by a heat ray that only heat them up to the point of burst into dust without giving them enough time to be set on fire, which is why their clothes survived intact. Nonliving objects that this ray was used on would be pushed back if they were small (car sized) or would collapse after several hits if they were like buildings. It is unknown how this worked- perhaps the pilot just pressed a button, or perhaps the ray could decide at will.  
The Tripod had many different tentacles, two would hold the heat ray, others would have cameras that could be used to search areas too small for the tripod, or they could pick up stragglers or other human beings. They were a part of the tripod most often shattered, as it would usually extend beyond the shield, making it easy pickings for whatever military vehicle was nearby.

Author Notes: Next chapter: The personal effects, battles, people's stories, etc. All that stuff, and the interviews will be like those in World War Z. Please review my first story!


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